


Occult Forces

by BarbaraKaterina



Series: 2019 Holiday Fics [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Halloween, M/M, Orientalism, Period-Typical Homophobia, Victorian Attitudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 18:31:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21257738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BarbaraKaterina/pseuds/BarbaraKaterina
Summary: Sherlock Holmes remembers a mystery from his younger years, and takes Watson to investigate a bookshop in Soho.Just a little something for Halloween.





	Occult Forces

In the years I spent by Sherlock Holmes's side, there were many mysteries I could have never published, but only one that would quite simply not have been believed. So allow me to retell it here, where I have less of a chance being called a liar. 

It was during one of the first cases we have worked on after Holmes’ long absence. The investigation concluded surprisingly early, and in a rather underwhelming manner that left us, I believe, both reluctant to simply return to Baker Street. Holmes seemed to think for a moment, then his eyes shone in that way they have when he gets an idea and he said: “Given the season, how would you like to investigate a little bit of an occult mystery?”

I must admit I was surprised by this suggestion - he had always claimed all such things to be nonsense, and kept to the firmly scientific. I suspected this was some sort of trick to be played on me. But I have never been especially good at arguing with him, and it had only been a few months since his miraculous return from the dead. I would have hardly refused him anything, let alone an inconsequential - I hoped - joke, so I acquiesced.

“Excellent,” Holmes said, “let us head to Soho then.”

Soho was not a location I would exactly have connected with the occult, so I was surprised - though perhaps it was something of the Oriental bend? There were plenty of Chinese folk living in those parts of London, and though that brand of the occult was not precisely what I would have associated with the season around All Hallows Eve, I supposed there might have been some sort of connection. I was not educated in these matters, but Holmes had recently returned from the Orient, so I expected that if anyone should know, it would be him.

“What is this about Holmes?” I asked when we were sitting in a cab, unwilling to share my theory in case it should prove - as it had often happened in the past - incorrect.

“Just a little matter that has been brought to my attention many years ago, before I met you,” he replied with a benevolent smile.

“And you let it lie until now, even though it caught your interest?” I asked incredulously. That was most unlike my friend.

“The nature of the matter is such that the investigation requires regular checking at rather long intervals of time,” he replied rather cryptically.

“Is it some form of long-term experiment?” I probed.

Holmes smiled a little and said: “It has to do with immortality.” And then, after catching my interest in such a fashion, he absolutely refused to elaborate for the rest of the journey, leaving me to wild imaginings of an Oriental alchemist brewing, over the span of decades, a concoction that would make one immortal.

I was awoken from these musings by the cab driver unceremoniously dropping us on the edges of Soho and refusing to go further. I was clearly doomed to be perpetually astonished in this case, though, for once we exited the hansom, Holmes headed to a small, eminently respectable-looking bookshop. 

I had not even been aware places like that existed in Soho at all, and it sat very ill with my theory of the Orient.

"Do you know this place, Holmes?" I could not resist asking. 

"Indeed. It has been here for many years." 

Even more interesting! I scarcely got any glimpses of my friend before he knew me, and the idea that he used to come here for some reason was intriguing.

We entered the shop, the bell above the door announcing our arrival, and a blond man sitting behind the counter looked up with a frown, which immediately changed into a smile when he took in Holmes.

My friend for his part marched directly to the man, whose face he examined from up close in a way that was really most impolite, only to declare, a moment later: "This is impossible!" 

The man only smiled in a placid, entirely unconcerned way and said a little fussily: "It is so very nice to see you again, dear Holmes! Why don't I make you some tea? It has been quite some time since you were here, has it not?" 

His tone sounded softly chiding at the end, and I had to stifle a laugh. I have never heard anyone speak to Holmes in that way in all the years I have known him. His brother, I suppose, came the closest, but it was still a far cry.

"And who is your friend?" The man asked, getting up from behind the counter. He was wearing a very elaborate light beige suit which certainly made him stand out, in more ways than one - its colour, its style, and the fact that it was clothing of markedly higher quality than shopkeepers tended to be able to afford.

"This is Dr. Watson," Holmes waved towards me negligently, still staring at the man. 

"A pleasure to meet you, dear doctor,” the mysterious man replied. “My name is Azra Fell." 

I shook his hand, very curious. "Have you known my friend for long?" I asked. 

"Ever since he came to London, really," Fell replied, directing us both to the back room for the promised tea. 

Holmes seemed to be finally done with his examination. "You don't look a day older than when I met you!" He declared. 

“You don’t look all that much older yourself,” Fell replied placidly, and he did have a point - Holmes had the kind of ageless face that had only changed very little in the time I had known him. I tried not to be too envious of that.

“Yes,” Holmes replied acerbically, “but I was not an established name with a shop with long tradition two decades ago.”

Fell beamed at him as if he had just performed an exceedingly clever trick. "Well, what is it you always say, dear? When you eliminate the impossible…" 

"But everything is impossible in this blasted case!" My friend exploded.

"Holmes!" I exclaimed, scandalised. Fell didn't look like the kind of man in front of which you should swear. His back room had a number of religious symbols in it, for Heaven’s sake!

However, any possible censure was forestalled by a man fairly slithering into the backroom from upstairs. 

"What's all this, then?" He asked. 

"Ah! New data!" Holmes exclaimed. 

The man scowled at him. "I know you," he said. "You're the detective fellow. What are you doing here?" 

"If you hadn't slept the century away, you would have known Mr. Holmes has been a frequent guest here some decade or two ago," Fell told him with some asperity. 

"Yes, clearly I can't leave you alone for a few years, if what you do is become friends with a blasted detective!"

Fell scowled at the use of such language, confirming my supposition, but I was distracted from watching his reaction by noticing Holmes’ obvious discomfort. It was a rare enough phenomenon, and it certainly could not have been caused by mere swearing!

My friend shifted on his feet, coughed a little, and then said: "Surely you realise, Mr…" 

"Crowley. Anthony J. Crowley,” the newcomer introduced himself with a flourish.

"Surely you realise, Mr. Crowley, that my frequent presence here some years ago, and indeed in Soho itself, implies I am not a danger in that regard." 

Crowley looked confused for a moment, but then his expression shifted to awkwardness and he only said: "Ah, yes, that.”

He had an advantage over me there, for I still had no idea what they were referring to. 

Holmes' eyes gleamed again, however, and he declared: "You thought I was speaking of something else! Interesting. Now, I very much regret that I didn't get the chance to meet you before… As it stands, I cannot verify whether you are subject to the same anomalies as Fell here." 

"I'll give you anomalies," Crowley muttered with a scowl.

“Tea!” Fell announced brightly, and began pouring out into four cups, so the brewing confrontation was interrupted as we each saw to getting our tea to our liking.

We settled down, and Holmes said, now in a friendlier tone: “You really must explain, Fell. I am extremely intrigued.”

“Bully for you,” Crowley muttered.

“Crowley, behave!” Fell chided.

“Bless it, angel, can’t you see this is dangerous?” Crowley asked, and suddenly it was all very clear to me - Holmes’ and Crowley’s awkwardness from moments before as well as Crowley’s worry about Holmes being a detective - though he did much more to betray them by that one endearment than Fell had with his friendship with Holmes, in truth.

I was also very interested in Holmes’ implication that he did not present any danger to Crowley’s and Fell’s situation. Not that I had ever thought he would hand over perpetrators of victimless crimes to the police, but the reasoning he had used was...telling, and intriguing.

Holmes, on the other hand, seemed to take something quite different from Crowley’s short pronouncement, for his eyes gleamed. “Angel, is it?” he asked, and I could not bring myself to believe he would truly ask after a couple’s way of addressing each other.

Crowley groaned, and Fell giggled. “He is truly very observant, my dear, I should have warned you,” he said, and then added: “Though if you read the stories about him, you would have known. My compliments, Dr. Watson, they are intriguing.”

I flushed a little. “Thank you,” I muttered, for some reason feeling this compliment much more than others. Perhaps it was because, well, this man was a bookseller after all. Surely he knew his books.

“You read detective stories?” Crowley asked him incredulously. “You?”

“When they are about someone I know as well as I know Holmes? Naturally,” Fell replied.

“Gentlemen, let us not get distracted,” Holmes interceded, focuding on Crowley. “I cannot help feeling,” he said, “that the moniker ‘angel’ would be most unfitting for you-”

For Heaven’s sake, he really was doing it! Before I could stop him, however, he continued: “-and yet I could not help but notice the claim that you had slept the century away.”

I stared at him.

“Think, Watson!” He said impatiently, noticing my expression. “What did I tell you about our reasons for coming here?”

“Immortality,” I muttered.

“Indeed. Now angels, if I remember my Sunday school correctly, are certainly considered immortal. However, I do not quite believe that descriptor rightly belongs to Mr. Crowley here…”

“I used to be, you know,” Crowley replied a little sullenly. “It’s just...been a while.”

“Ah,” Holmes said elaborately.

I stared at all three of them. “You are...actually serious,” I said then.

“When you eliminate the impossible, Watson…” my friend began.

”I would think the notion that we were sitting at a table with an angel and a demon was quite impossible!”

Holmes gave me a curious look. “What did you expect, then, when I indicated immortality?”

“I do not know, some alchemist formula or - well, or perhaps something like vampires,” I admitted reluctantly, “since you did refer to All Hallows Eve…”

“That’s just bloody typical,” Crowley muttered. “Angels and demons are too much, but vampires? Vampires would be fine.”

“One would think that the fact that we are explicitly talked of in the Bible, contrary to vampires, would help,” Fell agreed.

“Well, to be fair, there’s a lot of nonsense in the Bible, so how are they supposed to tell which is which?” Crowley pointed out.

Holmes watched them with a mix of fascination and amusement. “Do you actually have wings?” He asked then, a little out of the blue - but then again, it was a reasonable question to ask when you find out a man of your acquaintance is an angel, as much as anything can be a reasonable question under these circumstances.

Instead of a verbal answer, Fell simply spread his, leaving me to stare in astonishment even as Crowley groaned and Holmes got up to examine them from up close.

Fell let him for a while, then hid his wings wherever he did - it was physically impossible, and yet it was happening right before my eyes - and said: “Now sit down, dear Holmes, and tell me what you have been doing with yourself since I saw you last. As I have said, I have read the stories your young man wrote, but I am sure-”

Here he was obliged to break off, as Holmes flushed scarlet - something I had never seen before, and would have dearly liked to enjoy had I not been similarly affected - and began to mutter incoherent protests.

"Oh I'm so sorry!" Fell cried, alarmed. "After I read dr. Watson's stories, I thought for sure that-" 

It was my turn to protest incoherently. 

Crowley began to laugh. 

Fell gave him a nasty look and continued to apologise to my and Holmes' continued embarrassment. I don't know what was running through his mind, but mine was chiefly occupied by horror that my writing was so transparent. 

At length, Crowley said: "All right, stop torturing them, angel. That's supposed to be my domain." 

"I wasn't torturing anyone-" Fell began to protest, just as Holmes asked in a detached tone that must have cost even him some effort: "Is it? I would have thought that torture of sodomites was something traditionally celestial." 

Fell flinched, and Crowley scowled at Holmes. "Must you rub it in?" He asked. 

Holmes frowned a little in confusion, and Fell sighed. 

"Have you ever actually read the story of Sodom?" He asked. 

"I have. As you might understand, I felt it was somewhat relevant to me." 

"Then you should know it had little enough with the gender of one's lovers." 

"It did seem like a comparatively small problem, yes,” Holmes said a little sardonically.

Fell scowled at the euphemism. "It was a terrible place, and it ended terribly, and that humans would use its name to insult those whose taste in love is less conventional is-" 

I had not thought Fell was the type to get angry, but I had been wrong. He was. He was furious, in fact. 

Abruptly, I felt an enormous sense of relief, as if a burden I had been carrying for a very long time was removed. Here was an angel, an actual celestial being, angry on behalf of persecuted inverts everywhere. I have never truly thought that society and religion was right about us, but having an angel confirm there was nothing immoral in my desires was like a balm for the soul. 

Fell's angry monologue was still continuing, and quietly, as an aside, Crowley said to us: "Wilde was his friend, you know." 

I swallowed. The writer’s fate had shaken me and I didn't know the man. For someone who did… It must have been terrible. 

"Love is a blessing," Fell ended his rant. "The truest blessing from the Almighty, in all its forms, and you should cherish it whenever you find it. You only have a short time here… Don't let it go to waste.” He paused, giving us an intent look, and then returned to his cheerful tones and waved his hand at us. “Now go,” he said, “we have detained you here long enough." 

Obediently, we rose. However, as we were leaving, Holmes stopped in the door, turned, and said: "You should take your own advice, Fell."

We left with Crowley's intent and Fell's guilty expression following us out of the door. 

When an angel gives you an order, you do not argue, and so after a cab ride to Baker Street filled with not unpleasant tension, we did indeed stop wasting our time.

I could not tell who moved first, for in truth we had both known what would happen ever since leaving that shop, and we reached for each other as soon as we were in privacy and did not let go for a long time afterwards.

Fell took a little longer to listen, Holmes having rather less authority than he did, but we never stopped being grateful to him for giving us a very necessary push, and Holmes thought of him in his will and left our Sussex cottage to him after we both passed away. And in that cottage, almost a century after we had left the world of the living, he finally did follow his own advice and stopped wasting time, too. 

They still live there, according to what the seraphim who sometimes visit them tell us. And honestly? It is the best fate for the house of our happiness we could have wished for. 

Now if only we were given a chance to visit, too. But All Hallows Eve is approaching again, and the borders between the worlds will become thinner, and perhaps this time, our request will finally be approved…

**Author's Note:**

> My version of the Sodom story is [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20161450), but it's not a nice reading.


End file.
